h was as high as your head above the ground, was composed
of myriads of glow-worms all holding on to each other, and so forming
a dazzling canopy over the fairy ring. There were thousands of little
people looking on, but they were in shadow and drab in colour compared
to the glorious creatures within that luminous circle who were so
bewilderingly bright that Maimie had to wink hard all the time she
looked at them.

It was amazing and even irritating to her that the Duke of Christmas
Daisies should be able to keep out of love for a moment: yet out of love
his dusky grace still was: you could see it by the shamed looks of the
Queen and court (though they pretended not to care), by the way darling
ladies brought forward for his approval burst into tears as they were
told to pass on, and by his own most dreary face.

Maimie could also see the pompous doctor feeling the Duke's heart and
hear him give utterance to his parrot cry, and she was particularly
sorry for the Cupids, who stood in their fools' caps in obscure
places and, every time they heard that "Cold, quite cold," bowed their
disgraced little heads.

She was disappointed not to see Peter Pan, and I may as well tell you
now why he was so late that night. It was because his boat had got
wedged on the Serpentine between fields of floating ice, through which
he had to break a perilous passage with his trusty paddle.

The fairies had as yet scarcely missed him, for they could not dance, so
heavy were their hearts. They forget all the steps when they are sad
and remember them again when they are merry. David tells me that fairies
never say "We feel happy": what they say is, "We feel _dancey_."

Well, they were looking very undancy indeed, when sudden laughter broke
out among the onlookers, caused by Brownie, who had just arrived and was
insisting on her right to be presented to the Duke.

Maimie craned forward eagerly to see how her friend fared, though she
had really no hope; no one seemed to have the least hope except Brownie
herself who, however, was absolutely confident. She was led before his
grace, and the doctor putting a finger carelessly on the ducal heart,
which for convenience sake was reached by a little trap-door in his
diamond shirt, had begun to say mechanically, "Cold, qui--," when he
stopped abruptly.

"What's this?" he cried, and first he shook the heart like a watch, and
then put his ear to it.

"Bless my soul!" cried the doctor, and by this t